''ITV News Lookaround'' is the name of a British television news service produced by

ITV Tyne Tees & Border ITV Tyne Tees & Border is the producer of regional programming for the ITV Tyne Tees and ITV Border franchises. Between 2009 and 2013, the two regions were merged into a single region (although still with two franchises). Since 2013, each region r ...

and broadcasting to the

ITV Border ITV Border, previously Border Television and commonly referred to as simply Border, is the Channel 3 service provided by ITV Broadcasting Limited for the England/Scotland border region, covering most of Cumbria and Dumfries and Galloway, th ...

region.

Overview

''Lookaround'' is produced and broadcast from studios at The Watermark,

Gateshead Gateshead () is a town in the Gateshead Metropolitan Borough of Tyne and Wear, England. It is on the River Tyne's southern bank. The town's attractions include the twenty metre tall Angel of the North sculpture on the town's southern outskirts, ...

with reporters also based at offices in

Carlisle Carlisle ( , ; from ) is a city in the Cumberland district of Cumbria, England. Carlisle's early history is marked by the establishment of a settlement called Luguvalium to serve forts along Hadrian's Wall in Roman Britain. Due to its pro ...

and

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

. Both regional services (i.e '' ITV News Tyne Tees'' and ''Lookaround'') utilise exactly the same presenter(s) and studio/set, therefore one of the two programmes - depending on the day's news - is pre-recorded 'as live' shortly before broadcast. The "Lookaround" news service transmits to a vast area – central and northern

Cumbria Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial county in North West England. It borders the Scottish council areas of Dumfries and Galloway and Scottish Borders to the north, Northumberland and County Durham to the east, North Yorkshire to the south-east, Lancash ...

Dumfries and Galloway Dumfries and Galloway (; ) is one of the 32 unitary council areas of Scotland, located in the western part of the Southern Uplands. It is bordered by East Ayrshire, South Ayrshire, and South Lanarkshire to the north; Scottish Borders to the no ...

, parts of

South Ayrshire South Ayrshire (; , ) is one of thirty-two council areas of Scotland, covering the southern part of Ayrshire. It borders onto Dumfries and Galloway, East Ayrshire and North Ayrshire. South Ayrshire had an estimated population in 2021 of 112,45 ...

, the

Scottish Borders The Scottish Borders is one of 32 council areas of Scotland. It is bordered by West Lothian, Edinburgh, Midlothian, and East Lothian to the north, the North Sea to the east, Dumfries and Galloway to the south-west, South Lanarkshire to the we ...

and overlap areas of

Northumberland Northumberland ( ) is a ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in North East England, on the Anglo-Scottish border, border with Scotland. It is bordered by the North Sea to the east, Tyne and Wear and County Durham to the south, Cumb ...

. The

Isle of Man The Isle of Man ( , also ), or Mann ( ), is a self-governing British Crown Dependency in the Irish Sea, between Great Britain and Ireland. As head of state, Charles III holds the title Lord of Mann and is represented by a Lieutenant Govern ...

was also served by ITV Border until 2009. Viewers in

Barrow-in-Furness Barrow-in-Furness is a port town and civil parish (as just "Barrow") in the Westmorland and Furness district of Cumbria, England. Historic counties of England, Historically in the county of Lancashire, it was incorporated as a municipal borou ...

and

Millom Millom is a town and civil parish on the north shore of the estuary of the River Duddon in southernmost Cumberland, Cumbria, England. It is situated just outside the Lake District National Park, about north of Barrow-in-Furness ( by road) and ...

receive ITV Granada Reports due to these towns receiving their TV signal from the Winter Hill TV transmitter.

History

ITV Border

Border Television's regional news service began on 1 September 1961 from studios at Harraby,

. Initially producing short evening bulletins and a topical magazine programme called ''Focus'', ''Lookaround'' would become the station's flagship daily programme later on in the decade. Shorter bulletins were known as ''Border News''. Meanwhile, Tyne Tees Television had its own wholly separate news services. ''Lookaround'' is also known locally in

Cumbrian dialect Cumbrian dialect or Cumberland dialect is a local dialect of Northern England in decline, spoken in Cumberland, Westmorland and Lancashire North of the Sands. Some parts of Cumbria have a more North-East English sound to them. Whilst clear ...

as "Border Crack an' Deekabout" In 1989, Border began providing a sub-regional news service for viewers served by the Selkirk transmitter, consisting of a short opt-out during ''Lookaround'' each weeknight. In April 1999, the opt-out was extended to cover

and a dedicated Scottish news bulletin was introduced on weekday lunchtimes. Border also opened an Edinburgh bureau to provide coverage of the

Scottish Parliament The Scottish Parliament ( ; ) is the Devolution in the United Kingdom, devolved, unicameral legislature of Scotland. It is located in the Holyrood, Edinburgh, Holyrood area of Edinburgh, and is frequently referred to by the metonym 'Holyrood'. ...

ITV Tyne Tees & Border

Proposed merger

In September 2007,

ITV plc ITV plc is a British media company that holds 13 of the 15 regional television licences that make up the ITV (TV network), ITV network (Channel 3), the oldest and largest commercial terrestrial television network in the United Kingdom. ITV plc ...

announced that ITV Border news operations would be merged with ITV Tyne Tees, subject to the approval from the regulator

Ofcom The Office of Communications, commonly known as Ofcom, is the government-approved regulatory and competition authority for the broadcasting, internet, telecommunications and mail, postal industries of the United Kingdom. Ofcom has wide-rang ...

. On 24 April 2008, a campaign to save the ITV Border news operation arrived in London with a petition of 9000 signed by viewers. This was ahead of MPs meeting with industry regulator

Ofcom authorises ITV's plans

On 26 September 2008, Ofcom authorised ITV's plans to save £40m a year by making regional programming cutbacks. These include axing mid-morning bulletins on weekdays and lunchtime bulletins at weekends, plus merging a number of regions and halving the number of non-news regional programmes. On 30 September 2008, it was announced the number of ITV Border employees would be slashed from 64 to 13. Following a survey of

viewers in autumn 2008, coverage of the Isle of Man was transferred from ITV Border to

ITV Granada ITV Granada, formerly known as Granada Television, is the ITV (TV network), ITV franchisee for the North West of England and Isle of Man. From 1956 to 1968 it broadcast to both the north west and Yorkshire on weekdays only, as ABC Weekend TV, ...

in July 2009.

''Lookaround'' begins transmitting from Gateshead

''Lookaround'' retains an office in

where the news editor, planning and online teams are based along with correspondents, but as of February 2009, the programme is transmitted from ITV Tyne Tees' studios at The Watermark,

. The lead presenters were announced as the then ''North East Tonight'' South edition presenters Ian Payne and Pam Royle.Tyne Tees news presenters axed in cost cuts
, ChronicleLive, 3 December 2008 Then ''Lookaround'' presenters Tim Backshall and Helen Carnell were redeployed as a news reporter and early presenter respectively.Full Border TV Lookaround line-up revealed
, News & Star, 17 January 2009ITV Border: Meet the team
itv.com, 12 December 2013 As part of the merger, six district reporters were appointed – working from home unless based in Carlisle or

. The district reporters announced were Victoria Hoe in

Kendal Kendal, once Kirkby in Kendal or Kirkby Kendal, is a market town and civil parish in the unitary authority of Westmorland and Furness, England. It lies within the River Kent's dale, from which its name is derived, just outside the boundary of t ...

, Hannah Lomas in

, Lee Madan in Selkirk, Stuart Pollitt in

Whitehaven Whitehaven is a town and civil parish in the Cumberland (unitary authority), Cumberland district of Cumbria, England. It is a port on the north-west coast, and lies outside the Lake District National parks of England and Wales, National Park. ...

, Olivia Richwald in

Dumfries Dumfries ( ; ; from ) is a market town and former royal burgh in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland, near the mouth of the River Nith on the Solway Firth, from the Anglo-Scottish border. Dumfries is the county town of the Counties of Scotland, ...

and Kathryn Samson in

was formed on 25 February 2009, with ''Lookaround'' and '' North East Tonight'' titles retained for the 6pm programme and late bulletin each weekday, whilst shorter bulletins were known simply as ''Tyne Tees & Border News''. The then remaining sub-regional elements were: *The opening 15 minutes of the main 6pm programme. *Full late night bulletins on weeknights, following '' ITV News at Ten''. *Localised weather forecasts. On 14 January 2013, the news service was relaunched and rebranded as ''ITV News Lookaround''.

Southern Scotland coverage reviewed

On 23 May 2012, ITV announced proposals for further changes on its regional news programming, with "some content replaced with aggregate of news from several regions" and an expansion in sub-regional coverage. In November, upon the renewal of ITV's licences for a further ten years, Culture Secretary Maria Millar asked Ofcom to look into proposals for the Border region which would leave Southern Scotland viewers without "the same level of Scottish programming as viewers elsewhere in the country", covered by STV. In a consultation document, Ofcom set out two potential options, with any changes coming into effect in 2015 at the latest. ITV proposed re-introducing a full news service exclusively for the Border region, including the return of half-hour editions of ''Lookaround'' and short news bulletins, as well as introducing a weekly current affairs programme for the region. The second option was to enforce ITV Border to broadcast 90 minutes a week of non-news programming, including programming from STV. Press reports indicated a political split in opinion on the issue. In April, the Borders Chamber and members of the local authority at Newton and the Scottish Borders Chamber of Commerce publicly supported the second option – with the Chamber calling for a national ITV service for the whole of Scotland. Two members of the UK Government – Scottish Secretary of State

Michael Moore Michael Francis Moore is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and author. Moore's work frequently addresses various Social issue, social, political, and economic topics. He first became publicly known for his award-winning debut ...

and deputy

David Mundell David Gordon Mundell, (born 27 May 1962) is a Scottish Conservative Party politician and solicitor who has served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale since 2005. He previously served as Secretary of Stat ...

(both MPs in the Border region) – backed ITV's proposal for a Border current affairs programme while the Scottish Government called for STV programming (including '' Scotland Tonight'') to be simulcast. On 16 May 2013, the first televised Scottish independence debate was broadcast on STV's '' Scotland Tonight'' across northern and central Scotland, however viewers in the south of the country were unable to see it as

took the decision not to broadcast it, leading to further criticism from politicians in the region. Michael Jermey, ITV Director of News and Current Affairs, pledged some programming from STV would air on ITV Border. On 23 July 2013, OFCOM announced it had approved the second option of Scottish non-news programming. The regulator also ordered ITV to reopen the former Border Scotland service previously utilized for split news bulletins and simulcasts of select STV programming. The opt-out service was launched on Freeview in January 2014 and consists of a thrice-weekly political programme, ''

Representing Border ''Representing Border'' is a regional television current affairs programme, produced by ITV Tyne Tees & Border, covering political issues from Holyrood, Westminster and local government, affecting Dumfries and Galloway and the Scottish Border ...

'', and a weekly feature series, ''

Border Life ''Border Life'' is an ITV magazine programme serving the south of Scotland. Overview Typically broadcast most weeks on ITV Border Scotland on Fridays at 19:00, it opts out of the national ''ITV Evening News''. The programme features topical st ...

''. The bespoke local programming is not seen in Cumbria, where network programming continues to air.

''Lookaround'' fully restored

On 14 June 2013, it was reported ''Lookaround'' would be restored to a full 30-minute programme along with ITV recruiting journalists for an Autumn launch. A month later, Ofcom approved ITV's plans to restore Border's news service. All short bulletins – including daytime and weekend updates – are now exclusive to the Border region, however with the minutage decreased. The changes came into effect on 16 September 2013.

2020 - present

From March 2020, due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

services were impacted. Running times of all short bulletins were reduced. The main 6pm programme was now fronted by a single presenter instead of two. On 23 November 2020, it was announced the main 6pm programme would return to two presenters from that night, with a slightly modified studio to allow for social distancing. On 28 March 2021, ITV Tyne Tees & Border announced that Amy Lea would be the new co-presenter of the main weekday news programme alongside Ian Payne as of 29 March 2021, taking over from Pam Royle who left ITV on 26 March 2021.

References

External links